Kaiji Ito is a 26-year-old man who leads a hand-to-mouth existence working half-heartedly at his part-time job at a convenience store. He sees no purpose in life and keeps putting things off, telling himself "one day" or "soon." Every now and then, he relieves his frustration by kicking expensive cars. Although he doesn¡¦t admit it, he is the typical loser of today¡¦s society.One day, a mysterious, beautiful woman named Rinko Endo comes to see him. She is the president of an unscrupulous loan company and demands that Kaiji clear a debt he cosigned for a friend. With the company¡¦s exorbitant interest rate, the amount is blown up to 2.02 million yen. Kaiji, who lives from hand to mouth, has no way of getting hold of such money. Then Endo sweetly informs the desperate Kaiji that he can not only clear the debt overnight but can also make a lot of money for himself at the same time. She says everything will become clear if he boards a ship that leaves Harumi Port in a few hours. The ship¡¦s name is Espoir, which means "hope" in French. Kaiji is skeptical at first but when Endo tells him that "it is his chance to change his life," he makes up his mind to accept the invitation, but without realizing he has taken Endo¡¦s bait¡Kand late that night, Kaiji boards the luxurious Espoir